


this gravity elastic feeling

by perpetualskies



Category: Sand Castle (2017)
Genre: Do Not Repost to Other Sites, M/M, matt decides to carpe diem the shit out of his life, set in the aftermath of the operation with the intel from kadeer's brother, these boys give me serotonin okay, tiniest background enzo/burton if you want to read it that way
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-07
Updated: 2020-07-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:27:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25133119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perpetualskies/pseuds/perpetualskies
Summary: “I have been thinking about this,” Matt says quietly, is half expecting Harper to pull rank.
Relationships: James Harper/Matt Ocre
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	this gravity elastic feeling

**Author's Note:**

> For H., and the lovely Viskovie <3
> 
> This fic does not seek to romanticize war or express support for the invasion of Iraq in any way.
> 
> Title, once again, from a letter by John Cage to Merce Cunningham, postmarked June 28, 1943.
> 
> Comments are ❤︎.

Matt doesn’t know why he does it; it’s like something in him snaps and decidedly doesn’t give a fuck. He doesn’t know he’s going to do it, either; not until he’s halfway through with it and way too far in to back out. Matt’s in his bunk, feeling his way around the absence of Enzo and Burton—he hasn’t even _tried_ to sleep. They had no chance to properly wash up to get the stench out either, the blood under their finger nails, have barely time to rest before they have to be back on the road. The empty bunks are coloured in with solemn, disconcerting darkness; Matt can make out a book still open on the night stand, the neck of a guitar propped up against a wall. Can’t help but think: if time moved backwards, this war would already be over, and he’d be moving towards something brighter, not the other way around.

Harper is still awake because Matt hears him sigh and turn every so often; he _knows_ what Harper sounds, or _doesn’t_ sound like when he’s asleep. He doesn’t know exactly how many nights he’s stayed awake just listening to him breathing—he knows it wouldn’t do him any good to count. It’s harder, almost, to wrap his mind around the fact that they’re alive, their chests obediently falling then expanding, that they’re still here, while someone else’s timeline frizzled out. Matt swallows, frowning at the ceiling; remembers the way Enzo kept saying _Sergeant, please_ and _he’s my friend._

Matt doesn’t really know what in him it is that finally short-circuits, that rises like a flare inside his chest; he swings his legs over the edge and lands a little wobbly, then turns around avoiding Harper’s eyes that open wide. Harper starts with, “Ocre, the fuck you do—” but Matt persists, lifts Harper’s blanket, slips in and presses to his chest. Harper _could_ just shove him out of his bunk and reprimand him, he almost _wishes_ that he did—but Matt is nothing if not stubborn and determined once he sets his mind to something, curls closer still, thinking that _something_ has to give way so _something else_ can make a little bit of sense.

Harper doesn’t push or shove or yell at him; is frighteningly still, in fact, while everything in Matt winds tighter, coils painfully into a spring. Eventually, as if they've reached some kind of silent understanding, Matt feels him drape an arm around his waist. Harper sighs, and settles in a little more comfortably around him; he says, “Ocre, you do _not_ have a knack for timing.” Matt lets out the longest breath right there against his chest.

The night moves past them, transient and indifferent, the fabric of it darker somehow, as if some stars forgot it was their turn to shine. Matt wonders if Harper has, in fact, been waiting for this; if they have shared something as simple as an unarticulated longing, have all this time looked for each other in the smallest of things along the way.

“It could’ve been us,” Matt says quietly. It’s painfully obvious; Matt’s young, and shaken, and needs to say it out loud still.

“It wasn’t.” Harper’s voice isn’t irritated, just tired. It makes Matt think: just how many times has Harper heard someone say the exact same thing to him before?

“But it _could_ have been,” he presses.

Harper sighs again, his fingers moving lightly up and down Matt’s back, along the column of his spine. “There are a lot of things that could have been.”

“Like Anne?” Matt asks before he can think better of it.

“Yeah,” Harper confirms after a long and heavy beat of silence, “like Anne.”

Matt doesn’t know how they will sleep, or eat, or else move from this; how they will laugh, or look each other in the eye. He doesn’t know how they will fix those pipes or move that tanker, or how they’ll deal with all this newfound silence at the end of each hypoxic day. Matt used to dream of foxgloves and the bleachers standing chipped and tall behind his high school, how it had felt to race against himself and not let up; now all he dreams of is too little water, and too much sand that swallows it all up.

“You really think we can still do this?” he asks.

“I think all we can do is try,” Harper replies.

Matt braces himself, it feels both frightening and frighteningly easy; the words line up and slip, untethered, off his tongue. “I have been thinking about this,” he says quietly, is half expecting Harper to pull rank.

“The pump station?”

“No,” Matt says, taking a shaky breath, “you.” He doesn’t know where all of this is coming from; he hasn’t even had anything to drink. He’s never thought: this is how I will go about it; this is how I will at least _try_ , for better or for worse. His heart is beating itself out of rhythm, hurdling towards something; he pushes back a little to look his Sergeant in the eye.

“I’m still your NCO, Matt,” Harper reminds him softly; Matt cups a hand to Harper’s cheek for a reply. He thinks: if time moved forwards, this war would keep and keep on raging; and maybe him and Harper would be moving closer, not apart. Matt bites his lip, his gaze dropping to Harper’s mouth. He whispers, “There is no one here but us.” All he’s been doing was getting to a war that never has been his in the first place; now all he wants is this: a night that stretches on forever, and Harper meeting him halfway.

“Matt—” Harper starts, his voice barely above a whisper.

Matt closes his eyes and then leans in.

Harper’s lips are softer than he expected; they’re plush, and make a perfect fit against Matt’s own. Matt feels a little heady with the rush of it, the sudden sheer necessity of doing this; he makes a fist in Harper’s T-Shirt, pushing and winding himself closer, edging Harper on. Burton was right: when this is over, some memories rather than other will already have fallen into place—the swing of a Humvee door, a bullet with too many names on it; the sun, the breeze, the dunes, and this.

“Hey, Matt, hey—slow down.” Harper breaks the kiss and tips his chin up, gently forcing him to look up.

Matt frowns, they’ve got _no time_ to wait, why doesn’t Harper get it? What good is slowing down to any of them, anyway? What good is _pride_ , what good is being _right_ about someone, then folding all that’s left of them into a box? Enzo and Burton were _right behind them_ —Matt tries and fails to wrap his mind around it still. He’s done being bumped around the course of war, feeling like he is overdue for some terrible fate to finally take notice; he wants this, _now_ , and is not going to give it up.

Harper kisses him slowly, delicately, his fingertips moving down the column of Matt’s throat. Matt makes a little noise, craning his neck and angling his head. Harper’s tongue is careful pushing forward, coaxing; Matt shivers, his thoughts blanking, body weak. His fingers find and close around the chain of Harper’s dogtags; he tugs a little, feeling Harper smile against his lips. “You’re _terribly_ impatient, Private,” he says, moving a hand down to Matt’s waist; Matt says, “Uh-huh,” and pries Harper’s legs open with a knee. He thinks: if time stood perfectly still against all odds and chances, if every second that accrued just slipped and fell away at once—

Matt feels both of Harper’s hands around his waist, his mouth still on him, his T-Shirt riding up, leaving a strip of skin unguarded by the hem. He makes a sound, a moan maybe, has barely got the time to think about it when he feels Harper tug his T-Shirt down again, pulling away. It pools low in his stomach, more than disappointment; he knows it’s useless to protest.

Harper draws an arm around Matt’s shoulders, presses his lips first to his cheek, then to his brow; Matt’s feeling anchored, locked in with desire; he runs his fingers through the short hair at the nape of Harper's neck and sighs.

“How ‘bout we get some sleep?” Harper says; Matt mumbles something grudgingly in response.

“What’s that?” Harper asks, graciously giving him room to wiggle.

“I said _old people always need to sleep_.”

Harper throws his head back, laughing. “This how you sweet-talk all your men?”

“I don’t,” Matt says, too fast, feeling the blood rush to his cheeks.

“Well, then I’m flattered,” Harper says softly, backing it up with one last kiss. He feels for Matt’s left hand and finds it. “Does it still hurt?” he asks, carefully taking it in his own.

“Only sometimes,” Matt replies, letting his eyes slip shut and his body relax around Harper’s. He’s tired too, exhausted, there’s no way around it; he can’t imagine ever getting up again—except he knows he has to, knows that come morning, they have a job to do, have to move things forward;  
have every fucking reason, and then some.

These days, Matt doesn’t think of home very often; it’s easier not to, simple as that. If he didn’t know how much his mother worried, he wouldn’t even call her; home makes you sloppy, makes your hands shake; you lag and stumble at the worst possible time. Being with Harper makes him feel like he can afford to; Matt gives himself permission, just this once. Presses his cheek to Harper’s and winds both of his arms around him. Thinks back to sleeping in, the wind moving the trees. Home-made iced-tea, his mother at the bottom of the stairwell. Just: rain, the college posters on his walls.

When Matt wakes up the light is fanning out in soft, unsaturated pastels, the sandbags keeping most of it at bay. Harper is still pressed close, still wound around him; Matt gently bargains for some space. Somewhere across the desert the sand shifts into shape, the heat guzzling on water; somewhere someone is kicking up some dust along the budding course of day. Matt wants this to be them, countless times over; wants more than bunk beds, grime and IEDs. He runs his fingers lightly across the faintest trace of stubble along Harper’s jawline, looking his full and smiling; Harper stirs.

“Morning,” Harper says without opening his eyes and pulls him back against his chest.

Matt’s brain is still struggling to square away the images from last night—the flash of the RPG, the blood across the back seat; somebody will have to clean up that Humvee. Right about now Burton would yawn and start pestering Enzo about coffee, and Enzo’d always tell him to _keep on dreaming, B-boy_ on the way to the bathroom but still somehow come back with two tin cups of coffee every time.

Harper opens one sleepy eye and looks down at Matt looking up at him. “You sleep alright?” he asks.

Matt thinks on it and is surprised to hear himself say yes.

Harper presses a messy kiss to the side of his head, nuzzling into his hair a little, then says, “We better get ready. We've got a long, long day ahead of us.”

Matt doesn’t even want to imagine _how_ long exactly. He only hopes it wasn’t all for nothing—not Chutsky, not Enzo, not Burton, not Kadeer. Matt sees it now: it’s not that he doesn’t belong here—it’s that, in fact, none of them do. A different Matt would have known better, maybe; a different world would have perhaps not looked away. This other Matt would have met Harper at a gas station, a coffee shop, at an away game; at night they would have turned on the TV and seen no bombs go off in the centre of Baghdad. He’ll have the rest of his entire life to think about what the fuck he had been doing here in the first place; he wants to tell this story, and tell it _right_. He just has to make it out of Baqubah first.

He presses a kiss to Harper’s shoulder, running a hand up Harper’s arm. “And after?” he asks, forcing himself to look back up.

Harper shakes his head, smiling. “And after we can maybe talk about sleeping arrangements. _Maybe_ ,” he cautions, pointedly raising his eyebrows, smiling still.

Matt smiles wide—it’s all he’d hoped to hear.


End file.
